Abstract

Globalization, immigration and the multiculturalization of society have had a deep impact on Finland in the last few decades. But what effect did these altered cultural-societal circumstances have on literary life in Finland in the early 2000s? The object of research in this article-based dissertation is the transnationalization of literary life in Finland. This is investigated through what is called ’new transnational literature’ in this study by means of analyzing literature published by writers with migrant backgrounds during the first decade of the 20th century in Finland. The study analyzes the reception of debut novels by Ranya ElRamly, Umayya Abu-Hanna, Zinaida Linden and Alexandra Salmela. Furthermore, it considers how this reception has implicitly defined and canonized Finnish literature, and how transnational and cross-border writers are situated in the literary field in Finland. By problematizing how to approach the transnational in literary studies, this dissertation contributes to current debates on methodological nationalism.

The research material consists of works of fiction as well as texts published on internet and print media that deal with the reception of the novels. These sources are examined within the framework of cultural studies, mainly from the perspectives of close reading and sociological criticism, media studies-oriented reception theory, and the history of literature, as well as transnational approach that goes beyond national framework.

This research demonstrates that approximately 90 writers with migrant backgrounds, often writing in languages other than Finnish, Swedish or Sami, have published texts in Finland in the 2000s. Although many of them have been successful, most of them have continued working without due recognition hampered by prevailing monolingualism. New transnational literary works have been placed in rigid categories, and the reception has emphasized authors’ backgrounds and national borders, thus concealing the literary dimensions and qualities of their works. New transnational literature questions the understanding of literature as nation-bound. According to this study, Finnish literary life appears to be a transnational and multi-lingual space, in which writers simultaneously belong to both transnational and national literary cultures. The significance of gender is also evident, in that women writers and their books have had a pivotal role in the transnationalization of Finnish literature.